More than 4,000 flee rebel-held east Aleppo: Syrian monitor

Beirut: More than 4,000 civilians have fled eastern Aleppo in the past 24 hours as regime forces advance against rebel-held districts of Syria’s second city, a monitor said today.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that nearly 1,700 civilians had fled to government-held parts of western Aleppo and another 2,500 to the Kurdish-controlled northern district of Sheikh Maksoud.

The Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a wide network of sources inside Syria for its information, said earlier more than 500 civilians had fled east Aleppo towards government-held areas of the divided battleground city.

This exodus — the first of its kind since 2012 — comes after the Syrian regime seized the city’s largest rebel-held district of Masaken Hanano yesterday in its latest assault to retake the entire city.